58 replies to this topic

[dretceterini]

I would like to get everyones opinion on this:

What name should really be used for these cars? Many had modified FIAT chassis, but there were also makers of tubular chassis such as Nardi and Gilco; in fact, you could really call (IMO) any Ferrari built from 1947-1958 a Gilco!

If the car has a tubular chassis, should it really be called a FIAT? Many companies made cylinder heads for Topolino and 1100, and some, even earlier like Silvani. Giannini made a 3 main bearing bottom end for Topolino. Many companies made intake manifolds. There were many coachbuilders.

So what would you really call a car with a Gilco chassis, a modified Topolino motor with a Giannini bottom end, a Roselli testadoro hemi cyclider head that might have been actually been made by Casa Dell Auto (Giorgio Giusti), an intake manifold with 2 downdraft 1bbls made by ?, the car assembled by Roselli, and coachwork by Colli? HELP!!



Dott.Ing.Stuart Schaller
etceterinidoctor@yahoo

PS: In addition to the above mentioned book, The Coppa Dolomiti book and Orsini's books on the MM and his Carambola are absolute musts on the subject

Anyone out there want to do books that is detailed as Orsini's MM book, but on the Targa and Coppa...full entry lists, etc...I'm willing to help but photos are virtually impossible here in the US

[dretceterini]

Opps...

forgot other must books on the subject....La Fiat va alla MM, published by Nada; Nada's book on the post war MM, and all the Fiat fuoriserie books by Alessando Sannia (I have only the topolino book) published by All Media srl in Torino...

[David McKinney]

To answer your original question, Dottore, I would call that a Roselli-Fiat, or if I wanted to be more particular, a Colli-bodied Roselli-Fiat.
Compare your example with a 1950s British sportscar everyone calls a Lotus-Ford, which might have a Williams & Pritchard body, an engine built by someone else but fitted with an Elva head, pistons by someone else again etc etc. It's still a Lotus-Ford.

[Doug Nye]

Quote

Originally posted by dretceterini
What name should really be used for these cars? Many had modified FIAT chassis, but there were also makers of tubular chassis such as Nardi and Gilco; in fact, you could really call (IMO) any Ferrari built from 1947-1958 a Gilco!

If I may offer a friendly word on this subject - it would seem appropriate to maintain a sense of proportion where chassis frames welded-up by Gilco Autotelaio are concerned. They were merely sub-contractors, specialists in this field, working as commissioned to customer's own designs. Rubery Owen performed a similar function here in the UK - Troutmann & Barnes did similar work in the US. Intellectual rights - huh, precious little 'intellectual' about many of these early frames - would today reside with the designer, the originator, not the blue collar sub-contract component manufacturer...Gilco.

In any case, doesn't 'Ferrari' or 'Maserati' or 'Stanguellini' sound so much more racey than 'Gilco'?

DCN

[dretceterini]

Mr.Nye (and all)

Gilco was more than just a subcontactor. Many of the chassis they built were designed "in house". And what about companies such as Nardi and CABI-Cattaneo? Should a car be named by the company that assembles the components (as was the case at Indy years ago), or by who actually made the chassis, as is the case currently with IRL and CART?

BTW, Gilco still exists, and is called Trafiltubi..

Maybe the way a car should be named is a case for the Atlas court?

Dott.Ing.Stuart Schaller

[alessandro silva]

Quote

Originally posted by Doug Nye


If I may offer a friendly word on this subject - it would seem appropriate to maintain a sense of proportion where chassis frames welded-up by Gilco Autotelaio are concerned. They were merely sub-contractors, specialists in this field, working as commissioned to customer's own designs.

DCN

Correct. That's the way Gilco worked. Only very few cars were made on original Gilco design on order by independent drivers. Sergio Mantovani started his career in one of these cars for instance.

[dretceterini]

Ok than, how about some help on this one:

Peter Zobian in Cambria,Californina has a car which we have been trying to identify with some certainty for 40 years.

The chassis appears to be Gilco, but they have no drawings of it. The body is a biposto barchetta by Motto. A Cisitalia badge fits perfectly in the holes still on the nose.

Segre of Ghia had the car at one time, and later Farrago (of Dual Ghia fame) had it. Peter found the car with a Mercedes 190 motor stuffed into it, but it came with an Abarth style Tipo 204 motor, that supposedly was supplied to Farrago from Savanouzzi himself.

We can find no record of the car being raced in the US. The color at the bottom is an orangey red, like on Giulietta spiders. The car was shown at some show in the Detroit area circa 1956. Peter got the car circa 1962. Any help would be GREATLY appreaciated..

Is it possible that this car is actually the Abarth 203? I realize Gilco had a chassis Tipo 203, but this one looks nothing like the 203 Gilco chassis pictured in the Gilco book; it's more elaborite and probibly later; circa 1949-50..

Thanks,
Stu

[Hans Etzrodt]

Quote

Originally posted by Doug Nye
.....Lotario Rangoni Machiavelli served as a pilot and was killed flight-testing - I believe at Modena - sometime during the Second World War? This would explain his postwar non-appearance.....

Rangoni was killed during WW II, testing a three-engined bomber.

[Udo K.]

Quote

Originally posted by Hans Etzrodt
Rangoni was killed during WW II, testing a three-engined bomber.

Hans, any idea on the correct date?